


Distraction

by HermitLibrary_Archivist



Category: Blake's 7
Genre: Angst, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-05-26
Updated: 2008-05-26
Packaged: 2018-04-21 13:05:06
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,214
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4830128
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HermitLibrary_Archivist/pseuds/HermitLibrary_Archivist
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>by Hades</p><p>Blake makes a disturbing discovery about Avon.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Distraction

**Author's Note:**

> Note from Judith and Aralias, the archivists: This story was originally archived at [Hermit.org Blake's 7 Library](http://fanlore.org/wiki/Hermit_Library), which was closed due to maintenance costs and lack of time. To preserve the archive, we began manually importing its works to the AO3 as an Open Doors-approved project in August 2015. We posted announcements about the move and emailed authors as we imported, but may not have reached everyone. If you are (or know) this author, please contact us using the e-mail address on [Hermit.org Blake's 7 Library collection profile](http://archiveofourown.org/collections/hermitlibrary/profile). 
> 
> This work has been backdated to 26th of May 2008, which is the last date the Hermit.org archive was updated, not the date this fic was written. In some cases, fics can be dated more precisely by searching for the zine they were originally published in on [Fanlore](http://fanlore.org/wiki/Main_Page).
> 
> Previously published in Freedom City.

Under normal circumstances, it would not have happened; but then, Avon could never be described as normal.

He'd been at it for days, winding me up, and I knew what he wanted. Damn it, it's not like I didn't feel it too. No man could be that oblivious, but..

Align yourself with Avon, and you risk losing everything. He has moments of total amorality. Every last piece of idealism he accuses me of clinging to misguidedly; every principle, every moral. I could lose them all.

Yes, I wanted him; but not at any price. I remember the fight clearly. I sought allies. They were thin on the ground, and the Terra Nostra seemed as good a prospect as any. We knew from the outset we could not trust them, that was the only difference. He disagreed, of course. There were just the two of us, on the flight deck. I asked him to put aside his concerns and support me, publicly at least, for the greater good. There was such a fire in his eyes and passion in his disagreement, and when he stopped speaking, he was inches away from me, and I walked away before I did something I would regret more than he.

A leader of men has to be strong. He cannot show favouritism.

But when he found me later...

When I am under pressure, when I need to think, hard, manual labour helps clear my mind. So I went to one of the maintenance shafts and began cleaning one of the floor-to-ceiling air vent grids. Zen is programmed to perform this function automatically, and it is revolting, grimy work, but a human touch will always be more thorough. And anyway, I wanted to do it.

So that is where he found me.

He secured the hatch behind him. I tried to ignore him, but of course, I couldn't.

'What do you want, Avon?'

His voice was assured and knowing. 'The same as you.'

He was right. I returned my attention to the vent.

Each step he took on the sheet metal flooring echoed in the cavity. He was a little way behind me. Then one step closer, touching, almost. Nothing so blatant as his hands, though.

'No.' I couldn't look at him.

'Yes. This has gone on long enough. It is affecting your judgement.'

He had given me something I could argue against. So now I could face him. I put down my wire pad and turned. 'I don't disagree purely to avoid having sex with you, Avon. I disagree because you are wrong.'

But he was too calm.

And too arousing, pale skin dressed, as usual, in black. Black or red, setting himself up as my personal demon. It was a mistake, looking at him.

That was my mistake.

He pushed me further back, so my spine was pressed to the metal grid behind me, and moved closer still, so our bodies touched, but other than that initial push, he did not lay a hand on me.

He said, 'Blake, we are going to test your theory,' and I could not reply.

But then, he would take silence as consent.

I denied what seemed inevitable. Our crew was too small to survive this kind of relationship between any of its members, let alone its leader and the devil's advocate.

'No, Avon. We are not.'

Then he pressed his hand to my cock. My erection. And a combination of factors, the heat through the fabric, the pressure, his hot breath on my face.. I almost gave in. But I had one defence left.

'Not dry, Avon. I'll hurt you.' He would have to see the logic of that, at least think about it for long enough to regain his senses, and for me to grip mine more firmly.

'Of course not.' And what filled me was not relief but disappointment, and my head was filled with images of what else I could do to him, of what he would do for me. None of which would come to fruition.

Until he said, 'I prepared myself. For. You.'

I closed my eyes and let the vent take the weight of my head, which was filled with new images. Avon widening himself for me, sliding gel inside himself, lingering too long as he became more and more aroused. I thought of him using his fingers, first, then sliding a replica penis inside himself, and it was the most revolting and erotic thing I could imagine. Masturbating himself, gripping himself firmly, cradling his own balls, clutching at the cock inside him, stopping just short of orgasm before he dressed and came to me.

There was a rustle of fabric, something light, and then his entire pelvis, not just his hand, was pushing against me, his erection firm and aligned with mine. I could, or imagined I could, feel the blood pulse through him.

I opened my eyes with longing and fear. His bare torso was dusted with dark curls, and I visualised kissing him gently, running my fingers across his chest.

No. This would be no romance.

Silent, he challenged me, pulling the first fastener on my shirt free. I nodded my agreement and he gave me some room to remove it completely.

Then, as if managing a delicate negotiation, we watched each other undress, neither giving anything for free. A shoe for a boot, a sock for a sock. An agonisingly slow and tantalsing process. I removed my trousers first, then Avon his.

He wore no undergarments, and for the first time I saw all of him, so aroused, so needy, but confident in himelf.

And I wanted all of him.

He claimed my nakedness himself, sliding his hands down my back and under the waistband of my pants, bending his knees as he lowered them to the floor. Before rising, he took me in his mouth.

At that moment, I lost any free will I had been deluding myself I possessed.

I took him roughly, furious with him and myself. In seconds, he was splayed against the wall. Although I could not see his face, I could watch his fingers curl and ball his hands into fists. I could hear the cries he made and those he fought to contain.

My own throat was silent; I was focusing on remembering to breath. And fighting my own animal instincts. The urge to hurt him, punish him, to repay him for every snide comment, every dig, every lustful stare he knew I could not fulfil.

But in Avon; there was no anger left in Avon, and no pain. His cries were of pleasure, his words of praise, and encouragement.

When I had enough sense to listen.

Me, the source of his arousal, the means of his fulfilment. In this, if in nothing else.

I found myself slowing, concentrating on him, on his pleasure. My own hands left the wall and moved to his hips, holding him so I could focus on my angle. On each thrust I moved slightly, seeking the spot that would not make him merely sigh, but make him half insane.

When I hit it, his fists unfurled, opened back into hands.

I tried again, the same way, and was rewarded with a shudder. The next movement was much, much slower, now I was sure I had it, but also much deeper. And for this, he said my name. Not a yell, or a cry, but a whisper, a need. The sound of my own name from his lips said with desire and something like gratitude. It touched me, far deeper than I had believed my feelings for him ran.

Once again, I withdrew and pushed in. Now my name was a moan, and I knew if I did not stop, I would climax the next time he said it. There were too many ways I wanted to touch him before that happened.

'Please,' he said as I slid out, and he turned, leaning against the cold steel wall. His eyes reflected... part of me. A need for release.

And I saw how easy it would be, to be cruel to him. To deny him. And knowing it would be a sufferance for him made it possible for me.

A possibility. But not a reality.

Facing him, I slid in again, experimented with position again, but this time, I could watch his eyes close and fight to re-open. His legs grew weak and I stood closer, pressing our bodies together, my cheek against his, my forehead pressed into hard metal, his chest against mine, and his cock hard against my stomach. Now he began to move too, his arms clinging to me.

Soon, I felt his orgasm, his semen on my skin, spasms around my cock.

That was not what finally brought me release.

It was a whisper, a murmur of gratitude, of satiation.

'Blake.'

It was instantaneous. I came fast, and harder than I can remember, and a deep peace was in me as I withdrew. He helped me stay on my shaking legs, and we rested, leaning, side by side, flat against the wall, before the effort became too great and we dropped to the floor.

He did not try to kiss me, and I did not ask him to, and neither of us asked what it meant, or if it would happen again.

So that was the first time.

###

He did not exactly give his support, but as Gan put up good enough a fight for both of them, he left it at that.

I was wrong. It was that simple. A severe error of judgement. Sometimes what I see as pragmatism is quite the opposite.

I grow frustrated with the limited communication the Federation leaves open to us, the resources and the manpower we have. I was looking for a short cut.

Sometimes I trip over my own feet in the rush.

I swear, apology was my only motivation.

Then again, I have rarely apologised, so perhaps it was not.

He was tired. I forgot how easily he grew tired. Sometimes, he would sleep for a whole day and not even be aware of it himself. I would watch him checking chronometers when he thought no one was looking.

He was unaccustomed to physical work, and felt stress more than I do. He could work through the night on a mental problem, but other tasks exhausted him.

It amused me, that he wore pyjamas. Like we mortals.

'Not now, Blake. I have a headache.'

'I didn't come for that.' I didn't think I had come for that. He was drawn, grey skinned, eyes heavily rimmed with blue bruised skin, which would vanish by morning, if he slept. By morning, he would appear as his usual self.

Fighting fit, and fighting.

'I was attempting humour. Evidently, I'm too tired to convey it.'

I don't know why. Maybe I was worried about him, and he sensed it. He invited me in, anyway.

And started to pull off his faded grey jersey top. I stilled his hands. 'No. I didn't come here for that.'

'No? Ah, well.' He opened his locker and took out a similar outfit to his own, in navy. A size larger, and then I noticed how much weight he had lost. A stone, at least. Obvious, if you were looking for it. Space, dried food, and battle did not agree with him.

'Maybe in the morning,' he said, throwing the bundle at me. I caught the top but not the trousers.

He turned the covers back and got into bed, facing the wall. Startled, I changed and got in after him. It seemed the natural thing to do. I wanted to.

It was comforting, more than anything else. I think he liked having someone with him. I know I did. Always too stubborn to admit it, though.

He pushed back against me, and was asleep in minutes.

I lay awake, watching him, until both kinds of warmth overtook me.

###

Sleeping in a strange bed has never been a problem for me. Sleeping with strange people, that I haven't mastered.

So it was a surprise when he awoke me with a hand sliding over my chest, underneath the fabric.

He didn't kiss me, so I didn't try to.

'What do you want, Blake?'

Did he mean generally, or there and then? His immediate intentions were clear. There was only one thing I wanted. I hadn't been able to get it out of my mind. And I was half asleep, which made me foolhardy. That and the fact that I couldn't not say it.

'I want to watch you. Watch you prepare yourself.'

He smiled lazily, taking no offence, and reached over me to turn the cabin temperature up. His body on top of mine, then gone, too soon.

With a few movements he was naked, and leaning across me again to retrieve a jar from the bedside table. He was without embarrassment, unlike myself. He kept glancing at me, checking for my reaction. I suppose my arousal was evident. He looked sufficient pleased with himself, so it must have been.

He put on quite a show. He is well practised. At one point, when I was close to touching him, he made me move.

'You'll get a better view from over there,' he said, indicating the chair. I sat over there.

He touched himself with great attention. His movements were precise and graceful. His eyes never left me.

When he had finished demonstrating on himself, he beckoned me over. Then he demonstrated on me. This time, though, he spoke. His fingers stroked inside me, as he revealed his fantasies. He told me how he thought of me as he masturbated, what he wanted me to do to him, and where, in slow, sensual detail.

His physical actions. I had experienced them before, with other partners, but not often, and never to such effect. Never with such intensity.

Never by Avon.

Then I was in his mouth, and he in mine, and it was too much, over too soon.

I looked at him, still so tired, and was overwhelmed by a new urge. To protect him.

I covered him, placed a pillow under his head, and almost kissed him goodbye.

###

I needed to find out if there really was anything wrong with him. While he slept, I went to the medical unit and accessed the records. His was encoded.

I began tapping my way in the long way round. No doubt Avon would find his way through in seconds. I knew a few tricks, but they took longer.

Vila appeared, popping up inconveniently as he often did. 'What are you doing?' He came to peer over my shoulder. I told him I was looking through old files, for general research.

'He won't like you looking, you know.'

'I'm not. Not for anything in particular.'

'So what you're looking for, he won't mind you seeing it? Because he'll be able to tell.'

'You can't be sure of that.'

'If it's any guide, he caught me. Anyway, if he wanted you to know, he'd tell you.'

There was something, then, and Vila knew about it. I had imagined myself as having a general concern for Avon's well-being, but I was chilled with the thought of discovery, more so with the prospect of ignorance. I had to know.

I kept my voice level, but heard it waiver. 'Fatal?'

Vila wouldn't discuss it. Avon didn't want to be treated like an invalid, he said. So I had to forget I'd even thought about looking, and treat Avon like the arrogant, supercilious git we knew he was. Which was rich, coming from Vila, who was softer on Avon than any of us, always conveniently making cups of tea, and tidying up after him.

'Don't you see, ' he said, 'It would be worse for him if we started being nice to him. He wouldn't know how to react at all. He probably feels pathetic enough as it is. He needs to have fights, good old hammer and tongs battles, to know he's still.. still important enough to fight with. Please, Blake,' and he had that indulgent expression again, the one that used to make me wonder if there was anything between them. The one that accompanied the sigh as he reluctantly trudged off to the kitchen. 'Don't take that away from him. And don't tell him I know. I'm pretending I didn't get that far into the file, and he's pretending to believe me.'

###

After Gan died, he didn't speak to me, except in response to commands, for almost a month. I didn't go to him. He didn't come to me.

I assumed he was grieving, in his own way. Not solely for Gan, partly for himself. Mortality. It curses and blesses us all. And I think he was having a bad spell. His energy came back in waves, giving me hope; then subsided as quickly, leaving him weak. I wanted to help; but the best way to help was to do nothing.

It wasn't to be. I had to let it go.

Pragmatism.

###

However. As I have said, pragmatism is sometimes my downfall. But in this case, I didn't even give it a chance. I set it aside.

The catalyst was, of all things, a woman. Or more accurately, her brother.

Avon wouldn't discuss the past, which was no surprise.

My jealousy, however, was.

Me? I respected freedom, personal choice. It's what we fight for. It's what everything had been about, the cause, the goal, the dream. And yet I wanted to possess him, to have him do my will. Perhaps by possession of him, I could protect him. From himself. Logically, my mind was unwilling. My flesh was the stronger force.

If only I had know what he actually needed was protection from me.

###

If it hadn't been for Del, things might have worked themselves out, in time. I might have moved on, Avon might have learnt forgiveness. Although that seemed unlikely.

I was confused. It had been a long time since Horizon, when Avon had come looking for me.

Perhaps back then, he had wanted to play the hero, or at least be exonerated of bastardy.

Perhaps it was practical; I hadn't yet discovered how long he expected his motor functions to work, and his medical file had been un-mysteriously erased. Maybe he needed us more than we knew.

Perhaps he just wanted me to be there to revile me, having proved me wrong once more.

Perhaps he just wanted me.

After Gan, it was different. Like Exbar. He was correcting his own mistakes.

*See, Blake? I may misjudge, but I don't murder.* That was always about him, not me. Bastard that I am, I refused to let him martyr himself for me. He never forgave me for that.

But whatever happened, my mind kept returning to Del Grant. The man whose admiration he sought. He didn't risk death for a million unknown souls on a planet he didn't care about. He did it to make his peace with Del Grant.

I wanted to be that important to him. To someone. Oh, hell, the rebel leaders had some kind of respect, admiration even, but for what they wanted me to be, the big Blake propaganda machine. Not for me, not Roj Blake.

I wanted to be admired as a man, as myself. Liked. Loved. Who doesn't?

My attempts with Avon were dire. I found myself setting him ridiculously simple tasks for a man of his ability, and being equally disproportionately pleased with the mediocre results he deigned to deliver. My blatant experiment in provoking a Pavlovian response. Be nice to Blake, do as he says, your life will be much better. Good boy, Avon.

It earned me the contempt I deserved.

Damn it, I wanted him to *want* to impress me.

Perhaps I overestimated the way things were with Grant. Perhaps Avon's life didn't mean the same thing to him, as it did to the rest of us. Is time, when you know how little of it you have left, worth more or less to you? Do risks have the same fear attached?

Meanwhile, I continued with my battle strategy, looking for Star One. The Great Hope.

Avon - well, frankly, he messed about. Gambling. Tinkering with little projects to make little bits of money he had little use for. What was he going to spend it on, and why, when we had a strong room loaded with every kind of treasures?

If that had been his only occupation, I could have let it lie.

But.

He was also quietly, strategically, stirring up feeling against me within my own crew. They all swayed. They doubted me where they had trusted before. All down to him. It had to be down to him. They questioned every decision. I had to explain, justify and defend to the point of stagnation.

And then, once he was sure of support, from his apathy, sprang action.

Frankly, he was out of control. Reckless with his own life, and others.

Including mine. He abandoned me, trying to kill Travis - long his goal, not mine. But he did it for me, he claimed. I neither asked for, nor wanted that. He called me an ingrate and idiot, and volleyed abuse at me as if we had just met.

I could not remember the last time he was so full of passion and life.

Did he think the end was close for me? Did he expect me, too, to die at Star One?

In his rage, he was magnificent. He was the man who came to me that first time, the man who told me what I wanted and needed, and was right, but forced it upon me anyway. The man of logic who seduced me against the protests of every bit of logic I have ever possessed.

And he made me want him again; just want him for himself, pure and simple.

And I couldn't have him.

I knew I couldn't win, fighting him. I'd tried and failed. My attempts to be worthy of his effort were ridiculed. My guerrilla warfare was a futile effort by a pathetic idealist.

He complied to my orders under protest, giving the minimum possible of himself.

It seemed as if the only time we had ever been in harmony, was in bed. And now, we did not go to bed.

Well all right.

This time, I was going to give him what he wanted. I wouldn't stop until I got the response I needed.

###

That morning, in his cabin. Before I had known for certain he was ill. The last time I could look at him and feel he was whole man.

That morning, he had told me of his secret fantasies.

Every man deserves to have one dream come true, before he dies.

###

It wasn't the last fight that pushed me to it. Not the speech he had so obviously prepared and been nursing until the opportunity presented itself - 'rivers of blood', and all the other memorable but meaningless rhetoric. Not the absence of a denial of my accusation. 'You really do hate me.'

It was a kiss. A chaste, innocuous kiss on the cheek, given to Jenna in thanks for a cup of tea. So unlike him, and so deliberately provocative.

After so many months of wanting and trying and failing, of rejection; and with the greatest challenge of our battle mere hours away. It was too much.

I knew how easy it would be, to be cruel to him.

I pulled him roughly by the arm. His cup hit the floor and shattered, spilling liquid everywhere.

I dragged him through the corridors to my cabin, flinging him down when we got there, so he lay at my feet.

############

I waited for his anger, or fear, or at least some sarcastic comment about free will or human rights or, as a minimum, the old standby, trust.

Nothing.

He didn't move from where he lay. I waited, as my fury withered. With my foot, I rolled him on to his back. He went easily. His eyes neither met nor avoided mine. He simply lay in position.

'Well?' I demanded. Feeble, but what else can you say, when you have manhandled your second in command into your quarters with no clear understanding of the motives behind the deed?

He looked at me with complete absence of emotion, his voice flat. A hollow man.

'Not particularly. But then, you already know that. So go on, Blake. Do whatever it is you have brought me here to do. Let's get it over with.' It was the passivity which affected me most, more than anything in the weeks leading up to this.

The grime from the sole of my boot lay grey against his black jersey. His face was still tired, drawn.

'Stand up.'

He raised an arm for me to help him. I did. His hand was clammy, and I examined it before I released it. Skin and bone, every vein visible, the fingernails blue toned. I had wondered, lord forgive me, if it was an elaborate hoax, to who knew what self serving end. But no. He was genuinely ill.

My shock at this, of finally being forced to acknowledge and comprehend it, at having my denial removed so forcibly, must have shown.

'There's nothing you can do, Blake. I need something even you cannot give me. Replacement parts, but a little more difficult to locate than the detector shield.'

And we still hadn't found them.

'What, exactly?' I had no idea how we would complete a transplant, but a lung, a kidney... we could do it. Any of us would have become a donor, any of us. 'I'll find someone to operate.'

'Like you did with Gan? Anyway,' he continued, before that remark could really bite, 'at present, my life expectancy is still greater than yours.'

So he wanted me to call it off. Still. After the long search, when we were so close. When I failed to react, he tried something harder. Intended to be harder, but more wry than with malice. 'We've already tried organ donation, Blake. As I recall, it made neither of us particularly happy.'

A cruel and poor joke, but I forced a half smile. He was so wrong. He had no idea.

He sat, unbidden, on the bed. 'We're going through with it then?'

'No,' I replied. 'I'm going through with it.'

'You know you can't do it without me. What if you can't break the security system?'

'Vila can handle it.'

'Can he? Unlikely, but perhaps. Can you trust him to kill for you, Blake?

Ah. Trust. You don't trust me, do you? You'll be there to watch me, Blake.

Make sure I don't become crazed with the power.' And, angry again, 'You won't have time for mistakes. Now get back to the flight deck, and let me get some sleep.'

He wanted to sleep there, in my room, in my bed. I was... touched.

But then again, he looked as if he would need help to get back to his own room. And he didn't want to need help.

####

I have no idea how long I slept for, but when I awoke, it was a few moments before I remembered where I was.

Ah yes. Blake's quarters. The stuff of long held and unfulfilled fantasy. I, however, was the sole occupant. Not exactly as I had imagined it would be.

It should have been a simple transaction, a mutual meeting of needs. But he is not a rational man, and I own, I had foolishly allowed myself to develop a fledgling emotional attachment to him.

When he brought, or more accurately forced, me into this room, he was certain that he would hurt me, physically.

I was equally certain that he would not. For one thing, the mission was reliant upon my expertise. Blake's protestations of Vila's equal competence were so much bluff and bluster.

For another, he is that most despicable of sub-species, the honourable man.

He is, was, unable to kick a dying man. Prod a little, but not actually kick.

Things might have ended so differently for us. Still ended, for it was not our time, and I was not the man I am now. But ended as adults, with the honesty he claimed so passionately to value.

Then, he would have left understanding my actions in the weeks and months following the death of Olag Gan. A simple man, but a good man.

A true military leader would have mourned the loss, and moved on. Gan would have expected him to.

Instead, we saw pain, pity, and fruitless soul searching. A crew without direction, a revolution without aim.

And me, in the midst of this? Well, of course, this rebel without a cause had nothing against which to rebel. I stayed because...

I had my own agenda.

It was a long time before he was his usual self. In the interim, I worked on our communications system, attempted to acquire some crystals, the normal kind of thing in which he engaged our energies. He himself set me the most futile of tasks, in pity, I suppose. By then, of course, he knew of my illness. I think he was trying to be kind.

He failed, inevitably. I wonder if we ever understood each other, or cared enough about the other to express that understanding? One supposition or the other is true by default.

The one thing I never forgot. I can recall his voice as he said it, clear as though he were in the room now. When I warned him of the effects on his team of a second death.

'It would be ironic, if it were you.'

Not merely ironic.

For Gan, someone he cared for as a colleague, a follower, he felt such pain.

And for a lover?

I could not ask him to watch me die.

I would not ask it of anyone.

I could barely watch it myself.

###

He tried, as I knew he would, to leave without me. Vila was changing into his surface clothes. I took his gun from him, and placed his jacket back in his locker.

Oh, for the gift of prediction. Even Orac would have been pressed to foretell our most unusual future.

If he had known, long ago, how it would end, with Travis, he would have executed the traitor himself, long before.

If he had known we would still be alive, Vila and Cally and I, and that we laid no blame; that we regarded the outcome as his, our victory; if he had known that, perhaps he would have had the courage to return to Liberator.

If he had known we would 'stumble across the parts I needed,' as we once spoke of some chips I required, I forget which, now. A non-Federated organ harvesting clinic, located within days of the end of the war. Not the most ethical unit I have employed; but then, I have never claimed to be a man of ethics.

We cannot live in remembrance of our regrets. They paralyse us.

We can only seek to make reparation in the unknown future.


End file.
